Class Review: AAR: ONSIGHT FIREARMS TRAINING Defensive Carbine, Cape Cod MA 07-19-20

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ONSIGHT FIREARMS TRAINING
www.oftllc.us
Defensive Carbine
July 19, 2020




Instructor: Ben DeWalt
Location: Cape Gun Works, Hyannis, Massachusetts
Weather: Indoor Range
Round Count: 550+/-
Cost: $175 Time: 10am – 5:00pm

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We had our safety briefing, identified medical personnel within the student body. Ben talked us through the range orientation, what to do if there was a training accident and medical services were needed. People were given jobs in the unlikely event something happened. Who to call, the correct words to say and the words do not say to the 911 operator.

We started off with unloaded guns at the 25 yard line, Ben explained the different positions we were going to use on the range, shooting position, high ready, low ready, High port and cross body port. We went over the proper way to load a magazine ensure it is seated and economy of motions to release the bolt to chamber a round. How and when safeties went on and when they came off. Ben made it clear where you finger should NOT BE when not shooting, ANYWHERE NEAR THE TRIGGER GUARD! Make sure we were aware of where our muzzle was pointing at all times! Each of us is responsible for our own safety. No one wants a gun pointed at them! Always be muzzle aware, ALWAYS!

We checked our zero at 25 yards, I made a quick necessary correction as I was using a new optic that I bore sighted in my home last night. Man, shooting 16 Ars inside was really friggin loud! I doubled up on my earpro and found I was having trouble hearing Ben's commands. I ended up with just using one ear plug under my electronic ear-pro. Still very loud. When a 308 Travor fired I felt my teeth shake

We shot from different ready positions into the center circle inside the chest on a Henderson NV PD Qualification Target (shout Henderson NV, I lived there for 4 years!) We worked mostly 15-20 yards from our targets. Being in a state where we are capped at 10 round mags there was a lot of reloading reps during the day, which is always good practice.

Before each drill, Ben would explain it, demo the entire drill and explain it again. I like that teaching approach. I like to hear the instructions and then see it being done correctly and then hear the instructions again.

We shot from standing, one knee kneeling, both knees kneeling, we learned how to turn safely with the gun and engage the target. Face left, Face right and about-face always being aware of where our muzzle was at all times. Many shots to center mass and face of our target. We varied the distance to our target doing mag changes as we needed to and clearing malfunctions if they occurred. Ben walked the line making suggestions on how we could improve our technique and encouragement when we did well. Never was anything negative said or any student called out in humiliation. Not all instructors are like this, Ben understands his students are not recruits and we are human beings that paid for this class on our time off. Not all instructors are like this. Ben is one of the good ones.

After lunch the basic skills we learned in the morning were used with movement in the drills. We moved forward and backward shooting on the move. We concentrated on keeping the gun level, and our sights on the target as we moved, we also had to keep the line dressed so we would not have anyone way in front of everyone else shooting. We did some fast paced drills of moving forward, backward, different levels (kneeling, squatting) as they were called out. It was awesome!

We paired up into buddy teams and one of us would do a mag dump as fast as we could while keeping the shots inside of the chest circle, when we came to bolt lock, we would peal out to our designated side and our buddy would step up and do his mag dump while keeping his shots inside the chest cicle. We continued this until we ran out of mags. I shot 150 rounds very fast, keeping 95% inside the intended area. My gun was HOT! As we recharged our mags Ben setup Paul Howe’s hostage sniper target.

We shot Howes hostage target after running 5-7 yards getting our heart rate elevated and I noticed my zero had shifted like 4” down, WTF? I could not understand what the heck was going on. On the fourth iteration, I noticed that my optic was shaking loose! It was a new optic and I had not gotten around to RED Loctiting it! f*** ME! BAD!. I tried to KY windage the remaining shots but I failed. As Ben was analyzing our targets, I DQ’d all six of them. I killed the hostage every time. I got the “look” from Ben. 100% user fault, rookie mistake. I excused myself from the line and went back to the loading tables to tighten and Loctite my optic. LESSON LEARNED!

We did Tom Given’s Casino drill using carbines, I shot it clean. But over the time limit and shot only four rounds on the number five symbol, (counting is hard with a public school education)

Our last drill of the day was the Blue Falcon, where we shot against each other until there was one winner. I got to the third round and lost when part of my sling was trying to get into the mag well as I was reloading a magazine. That was weird, but shoot enough and weird shit will happen.

We cleaned up and debriefed going around the group saying something we learned. For me it was the Loctite issue and sometimes “All skill is in vain when the Angel pisses in the flintlock of your musket”

I really like Ben. He is super knowledgeable, skillful, funny, humble and sometimes appropriately inappropriate. As the day goes on his jokes go downhill. He is a down to earth dude, that is easy to talk to fun to be around. I like to say I think Ben DeWalt and OnSight Firearms Training is one of the best training companies and best-kept secret within the training community. Absolutely take his class if you have the opportunity.
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Great write up of a great class! In answer to the question about what people were using. It was all ARs except one Tavor in .308. One guy had irons, everyone else had a dot of some flavor. I surprised about the equipment durability. Jeff mentioned his optic issue above. But another guy had to retire a rifle and get another. I believe the Tavor went down for a bit but the guy got it back running (maybe it was ammo or mag related?). A husband and wife team each started with their own rifles, but were down to sharing a rifle at the end, and one guy had a barrel nut come loose, which was tightened up along the way. So a decent amount of equipment issues dealt with in a relatively small group.
 
Sounds like some durability or lack thereof can be attributed to "kitchen-table" gunsmithing/operator headspace. Also, we are NOT limited to 10 round mags for ARs. Usually blue loctite is best for optics.

I like the red over the blue for carbines. I have found the blue will come loose after a class.

My issue with preban AR mags on concrete is when you drop them they have a tendency to break. On an outside range they don't seem to break as often as they do on a concrete slab.
 
What mount/torque spec were you using? I put Magpul "classic" magpuls on all my mags and not many issues dropping them on concrete or otherwise. What mags (Aluminum or plastic) were you having issues with?
 
What mount/torque spec were you using? I put Magpul "classic" magpuls on all my mags and not many issues dropping them on concrete or otherwise. What mags (Aluminum or plastic) were you having issues with?
various mounts over the years. Not sure about the torque.

I was unaware of prebans not being aluminium.
YES, the magpul USGI-L plates are awesome!
 
This was my first carbine class, and I’m excited to take another one with Ben.

It really pushed me out of my comfort level without being discouraging.

I think Ben is a great teacher, funny, and very patient.

For me the drills were very practical examples of more dynamic shooting versus prone at 100 yards.

Muzzle brakes really throw a lot of gas around, that took a while to get used to especially when moving and shooting in a line abreast

I used a plain M&P II with a 3x prism. That worked pretty well even in close, but the offset is something I need to take into account.
 
@jeffwatch great write up, thanks for posting, this statement though I can’t agree with and I think you’re missing an opportunity here.

“For me it was the Loctite issue and sometimes “All skill is in vain when the Angel pisses in the flintlock of your musket”

Especially the ‘all skill is in vain” part. Murphy’s Law comes into play more often than any of us would like (for you this time it was your RDS), lesson learned that electronics will all eventually fail at some point for some reason. Good to remember. But then what do we do?

For training purposes you axed the hostage all 6x only because the RDS was taken out of play, and that identifies an issue of not training enough with your BUIS. That’s exactly why they’re on there.

Not bashing on you, not at all, I enjoy reading your reviews very much, just another set of eyes and ears on this saying “hey look at it this way...” Another good lesson learned from your class.
 
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